911 miles of Missouri Back Roads

timebak

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Dang it, Steve!! I've got to take a day off from work and go with you!!! How about Friday? Gotta work tomorrow.

The wife and I stumbled onto that first church some years ago on a Sunday afternoon drive. And you're right: it's close to the state line. Is the second church in northern Adair County, MO?
 

eemsreno

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On your way to everywhere, , Iowa
Tim
I'm under strict quarantine because my granddaughter has no immune system at all. She can't even catch a cold, So if I ride with you I must stay my distance.
If that's good how about all them Trail roads just west of Kirksville? Have you ridden all them? Are there any really good ones?
I can be there by 9:00

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Have you ridden
Billy creek tr.
Dupree tr.
Pure air tr.
Blue sky tr.
Bootjack jersey tr.
nile tr
glen tr.
millay tr.
lookout tr.
sumac tr.
canaday cem. tr.
charie hill tr
indian hill tr
cedar tr
trecoda tr
sycamore tr
walnut creek tr
 
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max.arioli

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This thread is great! I am moving from UT to NWA soon and I was a bit worried about the lack of riding. I was obviously wrong about that! I know you are in MO and not AR, but it sure looks nice out there!
 

Sierra1

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That was my #1 guess, since you referred to it. But I would have automatically ass-summed that AR would have some fan-tastic riding. Lucky you. :)
 

timebak

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Steve, I ridden most everything south of Hwy 6, North of 11, west of Thousand Hills State Park, and east of Hwy 149. Also a fair amount of the stuff south of Hwy 11 and East of CC. Quite a bit of it can get pretty greasy when we've had a fair amount of rain. Right now, they're in pretty good shape. Unfortunately, the Adair County has been spreading gravel on the trails that have homes and traffic on them. A lot of these trails aren't as "interesting" as some of the stuff you've posted the past few days. Adair County has more money for road maintenance than the surrounding counties.

Huntington Trl, the connector trail between Campbell Cem Rd and Billy Creek is all dirt and I like it, but it's fairly short. Nind Trail is easy, but has a creek crossing on it and the old town of Nind has some pretty neat history.

Billy creek tr. - Easy gravel.
Dupree tr. - Easy gravel
Pure air tr.- Easy gravel
Blue sky tr. - Easy gravel, but a lesser travelled
Bootjack jersey tr. - Less travelled, but easy gravel
nile tr - you can still get up both the east and west sides of the loop but the northern part, by Hog Crk is gone.
glen tr. - this is the east side of the Nile Trl loop. I've only been on it in a 4wd truck and didn't try to make it through to Nile Trl because it was summer and the grass/weeds were really high.
millay tr. - less travelled, muddy when wet, but easy when dry.
lookout tr. - The north end is steep uphill going south off of Hwy 11, and is fun. Greasy as hell when wet. An old road, cut deep into the land, gets better as it goes south. Intersects with easy Yarrow Trl.
sumac tr. - nice couple of mile ride through pretty woods on a less travelled, but good condition, hard packed gravel road. Two or three wooded side roads off of it.
canaday cem. tr. - mile long gravel side road off of Sumac Tr.
charlie hill tr - nice road through beautiful countryside, keep going south on Bombadier Tr. when you come to end of Charlie Hill tr.
indian hill tr - flat, mostly straight, easy gravel road.
cedar tr -easy gravel.
trecoda tr - also known as Fedora Tr. Nice road, goes from gravel to dirt and back to gravel. Less travelled. I like this road, but relatively easy. Can be soft and muddy when wet.
sycamore tr - this is still a pretty cool road, although it's difficult, and maybe VERY difficult, or impossible, to get across Walnut Creek. The crossing has washed out, but the road is still there on both sides. Chariot Place Tr, just south of Sycamore still had a creek crossing that I could get through in my truck at low water the last time I was there, which was a couple of years ago. Don't know how it is now.
walnut creek tr - easy gravel road.

But there's hundreds and hundreds of miles of these trails. They go on and on and on.


Last edited: Yesterday at 4:56 PM
 
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timebak

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Steve:
One road that you'll love is Caravan Trl. Turns west off of Hwy 149, 2nd road to west, south of the Hwy 149/Hwy 156 intersection.

Also, if you go east on Hwy 156 for about a half mile or so from the intersection of Hwy 149, then turn south on Colorado St., thats a pretty good, lightly graveled road that wanders around quite a bit to the south and there's several good side roads off of it. Evergreen road, a couple of miles to the east of Colorado, is re-graveled fairly often, and it roughly parallels Colorado, but Colorado is the much better road for ADV bikes.
 

eemsreno

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On your way to everywhere, , Iowa
Out and about today.
This old school was still in Iowa on the way south.


Old bridge over the North Blackbird Creek.




Old school.


Old school at Stahl, Mo.


Lots of dirt.


And last an old school on H north of Worthington, Mo.
 

eemsreno

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Tim , sorry I missed hocking up with you, but my daughter would ban me from seeing my granddaughters.
So I hit up your private stock of Trail roads today. You've been holding out on us. These roads are great!
First good one was Long TR to Grandview. It had a tricky water crossing "not deep"











Then the really good one was Chariot Place. A beaver had damned up the low side and made for a deep crossing.




Then over to Nind. Great !






And some just cool old places.






Steve
 

timebak

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I was gonna go yesterday afternoon, but didn't because I pulled a muscle in my leg Thursday, but gonna try to go Saturday afternoon. Gonna go check out several others that I told you about. I've got get in the habit of stopping for photos like you do. I hated to hear that Sycamore Trl is blocked off now. It was one of my favorites. Hope I can add to your ride report.
 

timebak

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Steve: Here's the results of my riding yesterday: Dupree Tr was a bust. Fresh, heavy gravel from end to end made it slow and not much fun. Campbell Cemetery Tr was much better. Gravel, but hard packed. Then took the dirt connector between Campbell Cem Tr and Billy Creek Tr, which is Huntington Tr. A fun road but too short, less than 2 miles, wish it was lots longer.

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Billy Creek Tr is hardpacked gravel and was a good ride.
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An ice age glacial boulder at Huntington and Billy Creek Tr intersection.
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I also rode Pure Air Trail and it's also hardpacked gravel and a good ride. From there I headed over to Nile and Glen Trails.
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Old abandoned home at entrance to Nile Tr. Nile started off good, as you can see, but only a mile or so in, a farmer had it gated off past his house. And the road was dirt and looked great past the gate. Unfortunately, Glen Tr was heavily graveled up to a house, and again, was gated off at the house, less than 1/2 mile in. So the Nile loop is no more. That's a damn shame because it was a great ride down to and back up from Hog Creek going either way from Nile or Glen.
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After Nile/Glen, I headed down to Bootjack Tr. It was hardpacked gravel. Came upon this once-stately old home. It at one time had had a door that came out onto an upper porch above the front porch.
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Ran Bootjack to Jersey Tr. Bootjack changes to Hawthorn Tr at the Jersey Tr intersection.
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Hawthorn Tr going east from Bootjack/Jersey intersection. Good riding in beautiful country on hardpacked gravel. Will continue ride report on next post.
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timebak

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On Jersey Tr, headed south, I came across this old school. There were turkey vultures sitting on the ridge of the roof when I drove up. Would have made a great photo, but I couldn't get my phone/camera out quickly enough. I'm really surprised at the number of these old schools that are still standing (many just barely) in this part of the country.
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I ran Jersey Tr all the way down to Hwy 11 and then went east to where Lookout Tr turns south off of Hwy 11. Lookout Tr was fairly dry so I didn't hesitate and shot right up it...... And forgot to turn OFF the traction control. That was a pretty bad Tenere NOOB mistake. I've already posted a full report of this in the "Where did you TAKE your Tenere today?" section of the Super Tenere Discussion part of this forum. Here is the result of my over-enthusiasm: Pearl (my bike's name) got pissed at me and decided to lay down for a short nap. It's further down to the bottom of the hill than it looks in the photo.
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Looking up the hill to where Pearl is napping comfortably. From where I took this photo, it's about 100 yards back down to the bottom of the hill behind me. You can sort of get a fair idea of how rough, rocky and gnarly this hill is from this photo. The ledges are a foot tall, more than that in places. My friend Logan and I had Pearl back on her feet in short order and I practiced some techniques that I saw on the MOTOTREK videos for descending steep, rocky hills. I was surprised that even though I was coming down at a relative snail's pace, I still dragged the skid plate in several places
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Another shot looking downhill, northward on Lookout Trail, towards Hwy 11, from beside the napping Pearl. The hill is steeper and rougher than it looks in these photos. To the south, Lookout Tr intersects with Yarrow Tr. going south. Yarrow Tr runs along beside the Chariton River. Just before you reach the little community of Yarrow, there's a restaurant on Yarrow Tr called "Fort Chariton". The food is good and the beer is cold. I can recommend the place. I just hope he survives this COVID-19 shutdown.
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Next ride out, will be exploring more in this area and getting out of Adair County, so the roads should be more interesting for us Tenere and other ADV riders.
 
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Don in Lodi

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So folks can turn a public road into a private driveway? Sounds wrong somehow.
 

timebak

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So folks can turn a public road into a private driveway? Sounds wrong somehow.
Here in Missouri, each county is an entity unto itself, and the county road departments can do, or not do, as they see fit. So, in our county the rules of thumb they apply for unpaved county roads are: #1: Do school buses or emergency vehicles need to travel this road, or is the Average Daily Vehicle Count (ADVC) at or above "X" number of vehicles? ("X" is an arbitrary number chosen by the Road Dept. Manager) If the answer is Yes, then the county will keep the road graded and graveled. If No, then the road is allowed to return to dirt (or "mud", as the locals call them). #2: If it's a mud road, do multiple local tax-paying farmers (Amish don't count) need it for access to their properties, or do Amish live on the mud road, or does it allow access to a popular recreational area (hunting/fishing/camping etc.), or is it used by locals as a connector between two gravel or paved roads? If Yes, the county will keep the right-of-way somewhat clear and may grade it occasionally, but will not gravel it. If No, and there have been any law enforcement problems on the remote parts of the road, i.e: meth labs, drug problems, dumping/littering, excessive partying, etc., then at the point where the road no longer meets the conditions of #2, the county will vacate the right-of-way and encourage, and maybe even assist, the local farmer or landowner to gate off the old roadway.

The ones that are being closed are dead ends, loops that begin and end off of the same road, or there's a better alternate route nearby. There's an old roadway that goes across my wife's family's farm property and we can't leave an anhydrous ammonia tank cart there anymore because the damn meth-heads will steal some anhydrous and then leave the valve open and drain the whole tank.

Down south of here about 150 miles, in the Ozarks, the locals have realized the positive economic impact of having a lot of bikers, including ADV and dual sport bikers, in the area and are re-opening old logging roads and even making some new trails for us.

Hope that answers your question, although it doesn't make it any less aggravating.
 

rodeoclone

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Here in Missouri, each county is an entity unto itself, and the county road departments can do, or not do, as they see fit. So, in our county the rules of thumb they apply for unpaved county roads are: #1: Do school buses or emergency vehicles need to travel this road, or is the Average Daily Vehicle Count (ADVC) at or above "X" number of vehicles? ("X" is an arbitrary number chosen by the Road Dept. Manager) If the answer is Yes, then the county will keep the road graded and graveled. If No, then the road is allowed to return to dirt (or "mud", as the locals call them). #2: If it's a mud road, do multiple local tax-paying farmers (Amish don't count) need it for access to their properties, or do Amish live on the mud road, or does it allow access to a popular recreational area (hunting/fishing/camping etc.), or is it used by locals as a connector between two gravel or paved roads? If Yes, the county will keep the right-of-way somewhat clear and may grade it occasionally, but will not gravel it. If No, and there have been any law enforcement problems on the remote parts of the road, i.e: meth labs, drug problems, dumping/littering, excessive partying, etc., then at the point where the road no longer meets the conditions of #2, the county will vacate the right-of-way and encourage, and maybe even assist, the local farmer or landowner to gate off the old roadway.

The ones that are being closed are dead ends, loops that begin and end off of the same road, or there's a better alternate route nearby. There's an old roadway that goes across my wife's family's farm property and we can't leave an anhydrous ammonia tank cart there anymore because the damn meth-heads will steal some anhydrous and then leave the valve open and drain the whole tank.

Down south of here about 150 miles, in the Ozarks, the locals have realized the positive economic impact of having a lot of bikers, including ADV and dual sport bikers, in the area and are re-opening old logging roads and even making some new trails for us.

Hope that answers your question, although it doesn't make it any less aggravating.
Saturday I rode down and did some of the trails in a loop starting on Billy Creek at Novinger. Due to the rain/snow causing sticky wet clay/dirt, I turned around as the gravel ended on the trails, which was often. But I can see the fun when passable. Beautiful cow-calf country.
 
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